


There All Along: Of Mazes and Monkeys

by DarkWingsDarkWords48



Series: There All Along [2]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Best Friends, Bisexual Female Character, F/F, Friendship, Halloween, LGBTQ Character of Color, woman of color
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-11
Updated: 2015-07-11
Packaged: 2018-04-08 20:59:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4320495
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkWingsDarkWords48/pseuds/DarkWingsDarkWords48
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jemma Simmons would never have imagined just how much her life would be shaped by their friendship when she first befriended Skye Coulson that day, but now that she knew, she’d never give up the experience for anything. A real world AU, no powers, no SHIELD.</p>
<p>    Part Two: In which our girls enter a corn maze and someone gets punched</p>
            </blockquote>





	There All Along: Of Mazes and Monkeys

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't Agents of Shield or any related characters. If I did, it’d be Skimmons Central. They all belong to Disney/Marvel/ABC and their affiliated partners. I write this only for my enjoyment (and hopefully yours).
> 
> A/N: Hey all, back with that next installment of this series. This one is set early high school, so Jemma is 15 (she’d have just missed the age/birthdate cutoff in American schools to have been a grade ahead of Skye) and Skye is 14 in their first year of high school. 
> 
> Also, I was like halfway through writing this when I realized it was a completely different style than the last one. But after a bit of thought I realized my brain was two steps ahead of me because the style is just so Skye, who this chapter focuses on. So yeah, informal present tense will be my Skye writing style and more detached past tense will be for Jemma chapters because it fits both of them so perfectly IMO
> 
> Before we start I want to thank everyone for their reviews, likes, follows, and subscriptions and all that jazz, really appreciate the support and glad the first part got such a good reception.  
> Onto the story:

-=<=(14)=>=-

“Can't we go do the hay ride instead?” Jemma asks, voice quivering at the end of her question, and Skye glances over at her best friend.  

Jemma is looking warily at the towering stalks of corn in front of them and the dark gap that is the entrance to the maze. She’s got this little furrow in between her eyebrows, and she has one hand raised to her mouth, gnawing at her thumb, and her other arm is crossed over her stomach like she does when she's uncomfortable with a situation.

They are at their high school’s Halloween Festival, just a few months into their freshman year, and have been enjoying the festivities for much of the evening.  Carnival games, bobbing for apples, even a pumpkin carving contest that they both entered in – and Skye is quite proud that she managed to hook a third place victory for her Chewbacc-o’lantern, which won her a handy thirty bucks.

But now it is getting darker, and people are starting to take part in the spookier things, like the haunted house that had been set up – Jemma had straight up refused that one – or this nighttime walk through the corn maze.

Jemma is dressed up in a full on labcoat, looking every part a researcher - complete with a pair of chemistry goggles resting on top of her head.  Skye, on the other hand is dressed up as an 'archeologist' – or something thereabout.  Not something she wants to be, but really, Indiana Jones kicks some serious ass, and she is _rocking_ these khaki pants and this fedora. She’s even already had some of the seniors eyeing her for most of the night, and a few even trying to chat her up – which, _gross_.

"Fine, we can hit up the hay ride after this, Jems,” Skye concedes.  “C’mon, this won’t take long at all, you're awesome at puzzles like this."

Jemma glances up, still biting her thumbnail.  "Skye...." she sighs.

Skye shakes her head.  "I knew I shouldn’t have made you do that horror movie marathon with me last night," she mutters.

Skye reaches up and grabs Jemma’s wrist, pulling it away from her mouth before the honey-brown haired girl can chew her nails down to the quick.  Skye turns her hand and lets it slide down until their palms are pressed together, and then twines their fingers.  "So it’s a little creepy,” she says, “but its fine.  I’ll be right here with you the whole way, Jemma.  And I’ll punch any creepy serial killers in the face if they’re in there, ‘kay?"

Jemma giggles weakly when Skye clenches her other hand into a fist and shakes it toward the maze, and Skye knows she’s got her.

"Oh, very well, Skye," she finally groans.  "But I’m calling you in the middle of the night and waking you up if I have nightmares from this. I will not be the only one to suffer from your latest urge to frighten me.”

"Deal!" Skye grins, and moves slightly closer so their shoulders bump as she gives Jemma’s hand a little squeeze.

-=<=(14)=>=-

The maze is cast mostly in shadow, but there is enough light from the full moon – Skye almost wishes she’d gone as a werewolf now – that filters down through the thin clouds for them to see where they are going after they enter the maze.  The corn is tall, much taller than they are, and the shadows make it hard to keep track of where they've been, with every turn and dead end looking the same.

It's been over a half hour and Jemma’s hand is sweaty in hers, and she can tell that the longer they’re in here the more nervous and creeped out she gets by every noise and every sudden scream and shriek in the distance from others being startled throughout the maze.  And Skye knows it’s a huge several acre maze, but _she’s_ even getting a little unsettled by the creep factor and by how long it is taking them to find the way out.

 And _maybe_ she shouldn’t have done that horror movie marathon either. Because _maybe_ she’s starting to see Freddy Kruger and Jason-shaped shadows from the corner of her eyes, and _almost_ hearing the sound of unsheathing knives. And _maybe_ she’s holding Jemma’s hand a little too tight, even though the shorter girl doesn’t seem to mind.

There’s a rustling, the sound of footsteps, but it’s so dark and the wind is blowing and sounds are so strange amongst the stalks of corn that Skye has no idea where they’re coming from. But they’re moving closer – getting louder, and they can hear someone breathing heavily.

“H-hello?” Jemma calls out, her voice squeaking slightly. “Hello, we’re dreadfully lost, do you happen to know the way out?”

The footsteps speed up for a moment and then stop completely, and Skye is starting to _freak the hell out_ , and she feels Jemma’s other hand shoot up and grip her forearm tightly while her other hand holds hers with a death grip. And then – _then_ – they hear a fuckin’ _howl_ off in the distance like you hear in the movies before someone gets _eaten_ by something, and Jemma whimpers and Skye is very much feeling like doing the same thing right now.

The footsteps are still absent, but Skye is pretty sure she can hear soft rustling, like someone trying to be quiet and stealthy. But it’s hard to hear over her and Jemma’s heavy, frightened breathing, especially when the shorter girl has practically burrowed into Skye’s side, nails digging into Skye’s arm, and her mouth is currently located a few inches below Skye’s ear.

“Skye, this was a terrible idea,” Jemma says – so low it’s almost a whisper, and now Skye feels like an asshole because Jemma is shaking, and it sounds like she’s about to _cry_ and if she’d just gone on the stupid hayride like Jemma wanted, they wouldn’t be about to have their limbs hacked off by an ax murderer.

          “I know Jems, I’m sorry for-“ she starts to murmur.

          “BOO!” a loud shout emerges from _right_ behind them; Jemma screams and Skye yelps.

Then Skye is whirling around, using the arm Jemma is holding to shove the other girl behind her so that she has a fighting chance to get away. Skye’s free hand is curled into a fist and already swinging at the demented creature bursting from the shadows that looks like some sort of bloodthirsty Bigfoot to her.

          It connects, and the impact hurts her knuckles, but she thinks the fright of the moment must have given her a lot of strength because the creature-slash-ax-murderer tumbles backward like a felled tree after she hits it. She’s ready to move in and kick the crap out of it, her ears filled with the sound of the pounding of her blood and little else, but suddenly Jemma’s hands on her arm are holding her back, and Skye can faintly hear Jemma telling her to stop. A moaned “What.. the… hell….” that sounds decidedly Scottish and originates from the felled creature quickly tells her why.

          “ _Fitz?_ ” Skye sputters, moving closer so he is more visible in the light of the moon, and indeed she finds herself staring down at the slim young man who they met their first day at the high school and quickly became fast friends with. He’s literally as big of a nerd as both of them, and just about as brilliant as Jemma, and he fit right in almost immediately. Skye has even joked that they’re so close of a trio that all she needs is a lightning-bolt scar and a British accent and they’ll be truly complete.

          “Bloody hell, Skye, I think you broke my nose,” Leo Fitz mumbles through the gloved hands he is holding to his face.

          Jemma has let go of her hand, and kneels down next to him, carefully pulling his hands away so she can look at his nose – bleeding and a bit swollen-looking. She’s clearly trying not to giggle as she does so, and gingerly feels at his nose with her fingers.

The vision of the crazed Bigfoot does make sense, as Fitz is dressed up in a full body monkey costume. And really that’s not surprising because wow, he’s crazy-obsessed with monkeys, and Skye is almost a hundred percent certain that if he could legally do it he’d marry a monkey and settle down and raise little Fitzmonkey babies.

“Shit,” Skye mutters, and when Jemma shoots her a look, she rolls her eyes. “Sorry – _shoot_.”

“Well, it doesn’t appear to be broken, Fitz,” Jemma finally says, standing up and brushing corn-hair fibers off of her knees. “But it will be quite swollen for a while.”

She pulls a small kerchief – because of _course_ Jemma is carrying one even in costume – from a pocket and hands it to him to daub the blood from his nose. “What on _earth_ were you thinking, Fitz?”

“She hit me! Shouldn’t we be worrying about that? I think her costume is going to her head!” He asks, pointing a big monkey-glove finger at Skye.

“What? You’re the one creeping around and jumping out at us like a rabid monkey! You scared the heck out of us, you doofus! You’re lucky Jemma realized it was you – I was about to kick you in the nuts!”

Fitz’s eyes widen, and he quickly crosses his legs, turning his body to the side away from her.

“Honestly, Fitz, Skye is right, you scared me to death – it’s bad enough we were lost in here, and you thought it would be a good idea to scare us?” Jemma scolds, her arms crossed in front of her chest, looking sternly down at their friend.

“I, ah, yes?”   Fitz says cautiously. “I was actually looking for the two of you, but when I heard you say you were lost I couldn’t help it.”

“Prat,” Jemma huffs, smacking the back of his head, cushioned by the stuffed monkey headpiece he is wearing.

“ _Lucky_ prat,” Skye adds, nodding down toward the boots she had worn to complete her costume, even as she extends a hand to help him up, and she grins when she sees his face go white behind his mask.

“C’mon, let’s get out of this maze and go on that hayride, and get this monkey something for his nose, Jemma.”

Jemma laughs, and grabs Skye’s arm again while Skye loops her own over Fitz’s shoulders.

“Please tell me you know the way out after you went to all this trouble trying to scare us?”

“Not exactly, but I _have_ been making a map as I walked,” Fitz says, and fishes into some sort of pocket in his costume to pull out a piece of paper with an intricate drawing of the maze. “So we could follow it back to the entrance or use it to figure out the exit.”

Skye glances over to Jemma, meeting her eyes. “Entrance!” they both blurt out at the same time, making Fitz look at them in confusion.

“Okay then… this way,” Fitz points down an opening in the maze that they’d walked right past just a few minutes ago, and they make their way down it and Skye is pretty sure she can hear him muttering about archeologists with strong right hooks.

-=<=(14)=>=-

Skye’s eyelids scrape harshly as she squints them open to the harsh ringing sound that wakes her up. She’d been having a very nice dream about the rather uneventful hayride they’d been on, and realizing just how fortunate she was to have her friends – especially Jemma. She’d been a nervous, scared little girl when she met Jemma, and nearly hadn’t even spoken to her as she watched her that day in the forest, but something about the girl had led to her initiating their meeting.

Skye slaps angrily at her alarm clock for nearly half a minute before she realizes it isn’t what is making the noise. She groans when the ringing – which stops for nearly a minute – starts up again, and she forces herself to further wakefulness until she realizes it’s her phone. And she’s pretty sure she’s gonna murder whoever woke her up.

“Whozzit?” Skye manages after three swipes of the answer button on the screen, her lips sticky from that gross sleep-glue stuff that always tries to practically wire her mouth shut while she’s asleep.

“Skye….” Jemma’s soft, hesitant voice comes over the phone, and Skye’s almost certain she can even _hear_ the chewing-her-lip-when-she’s-uncertain thing that she’s seen Jemma do so many times.

She forces herself further awake at the realization of who called her, and forces back a yawn. “Crap, what time is it?” She pauses a beat and answers her own question by looking at the alarm clock glaring “3:30” in red letters at her. “Y’had a bad dream?”

“Mmhmm….” Jemma replies, sounding embarrassed.

“Wanna talk?”

“Actually,” Jemma says slowly, and then there’s a tapping at Skye’s window that makes her jump, and her eyes dart over to it and she sees Jemma peering into the window at her, brown eyes wide and pleading.

Skye tosses the phone down and hurries over to the window, stubbing her toe on her desk chair as she does so, and opens it to the cool night air. Jemma is shivering in a pair of jeans, and a hoodie that Skye is pretty sure Jemma filched from her, and her bike is resting against the big tree along the side of Skye’s home.

“C’mon,” Skye extends a hand to Jemma, and helps her climb in through the window, and then – after a little bit of struggle – they’re standing together, Jemma looking up at her.

“I’m sorry Skye,” Jemma says, wringing her hands together. “I was really just teasing when I said I’d wake you up, but my dream was terrible, and my parents had a _bit_ too much fun at their Halloween party and they’re passed out drunk in the living room, and…”

“So you came here,” Skye finishes. “It’s okay, Jems. You can stay the night if you want.”

“Thank you,” Jemma sighs, the tension of her shoulders leaving them.

“First things first, jammies,” Skye turns, striding over to her dresser, and it’s been far too long since they’ve had a proper sleepover but she still has the set of pajamas that Jemma likes best – Star Wars, of course, complete with Leia looking damn fierce, holding a blaster.

Jemma grins widely at them when Skye tosses them to her, and she peels out of her clothes and tugs them on while Skye hops back into bed and pulls the covers back. Jemma practically dives in, and pulls them up over the two of them, before sliding her arms around Skye, forcing her to stifle a shriek as two small, ice-cold hands burrow up the back of her shirt.

“Jeez, you’re cold. You really biked all the way here?”

Jemma nods, her cold nose pressed into Skye’s shoulder as she continues to practically envelop Skye in her attempt to get warm.

Skye just chuckles, and wraps her arms around the petite girl, pulling her even closer under the warmth of the covers. “D’you wanna talk about your dream?”

Jemma hums, and lifts her face out of Skye’s pajama shirt, resting her chin on Skye’s shoulder. “Would you know, I can’t even remember?” Jemma’s cheeks are red – probably from a mixture of embarrassment and cold air. “I just remember it was terrifying, and I woke up and all I could think about was wanting my best friend to hold me.”

Skye snorts, and squeezes Jemma in an even tighter hug. “That I can do, Jemma. Always.”

Jemma’s eyes wander up her face, and meet her own, and Skye finds her mouth speaking before she even thinks about it. “Thank you, Jemma - I’ll always be thankful that you were willing to be my friend, and put up with me. Even when I’m an idiot or when I get into trouble and pull you into it with me. Even when I talk you into watching scary movies and going into a creepy-ass corn maze.”

“How _couldn’t_ I be?” Jemma says, her voice completely open. “You’re amazing, Skye, and you’re always going to be my best friend.” Her lips curve into a sleepy smile. “Bad girl shenanigans and all.”

Skye sighs, and holds Jemma as she falls asleep, and it isn’t too long before she’s drifting back to sleep herself, dreaming of fighting Freddy Kruger and evil Sasquatches, with a pretty brunette by her side.

-=<=(14)=>=-

-=<=(14)=>=-

%MCEPASTEBIN%

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: So again, thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed this one as much as the last. I’ve got at least one more of these in the mostly-done stages and several others already outlined (the others being more college and later). The one I’m almost done with is a bit after this one, later in high school, and is a bit darker/angstier and handles a bit of a rough subject matter, but I’m liking how it’s coming along and it tells a very important part of this Skimmons AU in their lives.  
> Until next time!


End file.
